The Impact of Hate Crimes
on Families and Society
While the victims of hate crimes endure the ultimate
suffering, hate crimes also traumatize the victim's
families as well. Family members often feel guilty for
not being able to protect their loved ones from hate
crime perpetrators. Additionally, these feelings of
guilt and depression affect the family members' performance
at school or work. Family members also lose trust in
the criminal justice system if the perpetrator is not
caught or is not punished to the full extent of the
law.
In addition to the emotional trauma that families endure,
they may also experience severe financial difficulties.
If the victim of the hate crime dies as a result of
the crime, the family may be responsible for funeral
expenses and medical bills.
Extending beyond families of victims, hate crimes also
impact society as a whole. Hate crimes can effectively
intimidate members of the community to which the hate
crime victim belonged. Members of the targeted community
harbor feelings of vulnerability and feel neglected
by law enforcement agencies. If members of the targeted
communities are left to feel this way, they become suspicious
and less trusting of members of other groups.
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Additionally, increased fear within a community actually
leads to a decrease in reports of hate crimes committed
against members of that community. Community members
targeted as hate crime victims are often apprehensive
about reporting additional hate crimes because of the
fear of retaliation by the perpetrator.
Throughout the last decade, hate crimes committed against
gay, lesbian and transgender individuals have come to
the forefront of gay political organizing efforts. Likewise,
especially within the last year and a half, local and
national governments and the mainstream press have struggled
to determine the appropriate forms and levels of protection
necessary for sexual and gender minorities. Questioning
the emancipatory potential of hate crimes activism for
sexual and gender non-normative people, this paper outlines
the limits of criminal justice remedies to problems
of gender, race, economic and sexual subordination.
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